Rock Hall Class of 2014 Profiles

Wednesday:
- E Street Band is thrilled to be joining The Boss in the Hall
- Hall & Oates: a lesson in perseverance

Thursday:- Andrew Loog Oldham reminisces about his days with the Rolling Stones- Brian Epstein became a champion for the Beatles- Peter Gabriel: Genesis singer gets in on his own

Friday:- KISS finally gets a spot in the Rock Hall, but won't perform- Nirvana opens the flannel-shirt wing of the Rock Hall

CLEVELAND, Ohio – If there’s one word that describes Hall and Oates – the “rock and soul’’ duo of Daryl Hall and John Oates – it’s perseverance.

Like that famous fictional character from Philadelphia, these real-life musical Rockys believed in themselves and knew that even if they were down, they were never out. That feistiness will see them take the Barclays Center stage on Thursday, April 10, as part of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame’s Class of 2014.

But it wasn’t an easy road.

“We have been eligible since 1997,” said Oates in a call from his Nashville, Tenn., home. “Every year, you have somebody saying, ‘You’re eligible for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame,’ but we brushed it off for 20 years.

“We were eligible, but not getting chosen,” he said. “There must be a reason, but our life goes on. [Our philosophy was] Don’t cry in your beer over something you have no control over.”

But the duo’s fans decided they DID have control. Of that, Oates – who did all the talking for this interview, as Hall declined to participate – is certain.

“I think there was a groundswell,” he said. “Our fans certainly got behind it. We went on ‘Rachael Ray,’ and she went NUTS on national television, and little by little it happened.”

In a way, that sort of mirrors the career of Hall, now 67, and Oates, who will turn 65 three days before his induction into the Rock Hall.

“We made a lot of albums that weren’t so well-received,” Oates said. “We played arenas, went back down and played clubs, then back to arenas, then disappeared, then came back.”

Boy, have they.

Hall and Oates had six No. 1 singles, seven platinum albums and six gold albums. Moreover, Billboard ranked them the No. 1-selling duo in the rock era, surpassing the Everly Brothers.

And it all began with gunfire.

The two were leading separate bands – Hall had the Temptones and Oates, the Masters – at Philly’s Adelphi Ballroom in 1967, according to a bluesandsoul.com interview with Hall. They were there promoting separate singles when a gang fight broke out. Discretion being the better part of valor, the two high-tailed it out of the venue, via the same service elevator.

It was then that they discovered a like for the same kind of music, and that both were new students at Philadelphia’s Temple University. They became fast friends and eventually ended up sharing several apartments.

The group name actually came from the mailbox of one of those apartments: Hall & Oates, it read.

“We’re still out there, still playing together and still have individual lives as well,” said Oates in his interview.

The two will be playing Public Hall on May 10, even. And while both are making new music – Oates just put out a new album called “Good Road to Follow: Route 1, Route 2, Route 3,” based on separate EPs with Hot Chelle Rae, Vince Gill and Jerry Douglas – don’t look for new music at the Cleveland show.

“Our older hits and our older music is really kind of our canon,” Oates said. “It is what we have. I say that lightly, but I mean it seriously.

“The future of Hall and Oates is in its past,” he said. “We have such a wealth of music to play that we can’t play it all.

“Our problem is we have so many hits, but we want to dive into our catalog for the undiscovered gems,” he said. “We’re constantly looking for ways to insert our deep album tracks into our live shows.”

That’s one way the pair has been able to keep things fresh after all these years.

“Older songs are new songs to us,” Oates said. “We have a really cool thing we’re doing where we’re recycling our older stuff that sounds like new music.”

Even so, there is that distinct Hall and Oates sound – only now, it’s better.

“Daryl’s voice has always been the signature sound of the group, and rightly so,” said Oates. “The guy has been one of the greatest singers of all time.”

But since Oates has been doing more and more on his own, he’s been the beneficiary of a misfortune, as bizarre as that sounds.

“The best thing that happened to my voice is the fact that it wore out,” said Oates, whose “new” voice is far better than when he provided mostly backing vocals for Hall.

“I’ve discovered things in my singing that have opened up a whole new world for me, finding ways to sing that are comfortable for me,” he said.

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